


Well THAT'S gonna leave a stain

by TheIcyQueen



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Blood, Comedy, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Prompt Fic, Slice of Life, Tumblr Prompt, au where everything is the same but thedas has showers because fight me is why
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-07-08 16:34:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19872673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheIcyQueen/pseuds/TheIcyQueen
Summary: It was a well known rule in Kirkwall: If you needed to find Hawke, well...you just followed the blood. Really. Simple as that.Varric just wished she'd stop tracking it into his room.





	Well THAT'S gonna leave a stain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bigasswritingmagnet (thekumquat)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thekumquat/gifts).



> Written based on a prompt from bi-ass-magnet on tumblr!

One of the little joys of Hawke was always knowing where she was. If she wasn’t home in Hightown, then she was probably meeting with the viscount. If she wasn’t meeting with the viscount, then she was probably buzzing around the clinic trying to help Anders. If she wasn’t at the clinic, then she was probably two drinks deep in the Hanged Man. If she wasn’t at the Hanged Man, then Maker help you, all you had to do was follow the blood.

Foolproof.

Horrible on paper. Absolutely horrible! But…foolproof.

As luck would have it, the day had shaped up to be one of those rare occasions where Varric didn’t _need_ to follow the blood. _Had_ he followed it it? Yes. Did he _need_ to? Well, no, not really, because as it turned out, the blood had led to the Hanged Man.

Fantastic.

More to the point, it had led to…ah. Yeah. Of course.

His suite.

Great.

He groaned as he crossed the threshold into the room, eyes tracking the familiar footprints already beginning to congeal into an awful brackish color on the floor. It was obvious at once where the boots had gone—he didn’t even need to follow them with his eyes—the faint sound of water running was all the information he needed. Now, the _other_ prints, the ones that were only _slightly_ smaller but _significantly_ more numerous…

The Mabari lifted his head from his paws as Varric walked in, ears immediately perking up. Despite its huge, hulking frame, there was something undeniably puppy-like about Dog when he spotted a friendly face; he didn’t so much wag his tail as wiggle his entire backside to and fro when he recognized Varric, tongue lolling out from between his—yes, _bloody_ —teeth.

“No, down, _down_ ,” he said, noticing the tacky blood on its massive paws. Not that it mattered really, the damage was _done_. But Dog seemed happy enough to comply, dropping himself back down onto the rug with a huff of a bark, nubby tail still wagging madly. “You know,” Varric said conversationally enough, scratching Dog between the ears as he passed, “ _Sometimes_ I understand why everyone’s so tired of you Fereldans.”

As though in response, Dog barked cheerfully.

He paused just long enough to gingerly set Bianca down by his bed before crossing the room to the source of the noise. “You know, it’s the strangest thing…I feel like maybe you having your _own_ lavish home with its _own_ lavish facilities. Huh. Now, how can that be right? If that were true, then I do have to wonder why in the name of Andraste’s _most_ sacred knickers you always seem to end up in _mine_.” The door to the washroom was already standing open, so he barely had to raise his voice to be heard over the spray of water.

From where he stood leaning against the doorframe, he could see a faint ripple from behind the brilliant red shower curtain, and then lo and behold, it pulled aside just a smidge to reveal a waving arm. “Yours was closer!” Hawke said, voice just a bit _too_ bright with laughter, considering the veritable crime scene she’d left in her wake. “I couldn’t very well go traipsing about Hightown looking like something that’d just crawled out of the Deep Roads, now could I?”

“But you could traipse about my room—”

“Oh, come _on!”_ That time, the curtain was parted enough to reveal a fair sliver of Hawke herself, her dark hair wet and plastered to her face, horrid brownish-red rivulets dripping from the ends. “Now, whatever happened to ‘My palatial suite in the Hanged Man is _your_ palatial suite in the Hanged Man?’ Huh? What happened to that, Varric?” she asked, one hand gesturing madly as the other held the fabric of the curtain. Not to protect her modesty, of course—he had long since come to doubt Hawke had _ever_ been in possession of so much as a shred of the stuff—but more likely to keep him from seeing the extent of whatever mess she’d gotten herself into. 

“I don’t seem to remember the part where I okayed you redecorating the place.”

She rolled her eyes and disappeared behind the curtain again, the sound of the water changing as she ostensibly stuck her head under the spray. “Everything in here’s red already, I don’t see what the problem is.”

“Hey Hawke?”

“Mhm?”

“What color does blood turn when it dries? Is it red?”

There was a groan from her, followed by a distressingly meaty sounding _splat_ as _something_ was rinsed off. “I’ll help you clean later.” 

“ _Hawke_ …”

“Fine, _I_ will clean later.”

Varric sighed, more than just a little disappointed in himself when he realized he wasn’t half as annoyed as he was amused. He folded his arms across his chest and shook his head, glancing over his shoulder momentarily to check that Dog hadn’t begun the slow but inevitable creep towards his bed. “Hawke?”

The rungs holding the curtain up squeaked as she pushed the fabric aside again, blinking expectantly.

“I love you _so_ much,” he began, looking back at her just in time to see her entire face light up, her posture straightening with delight, “But you test me… _every_ day.” At that, her expression fell into something more sarcastic, her tongue jutting out in a juvenile display.

No sooner had he turned away from the room than Dog began barking, the sound of his nails clicking on the floor. Varric didn’t have time enough to whirl around before the heavy stomp of boots filled the room behind him, accompanied by the metallic clamor of armor.

“Hawke!”

As though the day hadn’t tested his patience enough. “Hello Aveline.” He pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger as he positively _felt_ her presence approaching him from behind, all sharp angles and righteous exasperation. “Come right on in. Good to see the city guard has finally figured out how to get the most out of the day—tell me, what _do_ you do with all the time you save _not_ knocking on doors?" 

She stopped in line with him, taking up the other half of the washroom’s doorway. “The door was open, Varric.”

“It was _ajar_ at best.”

In true Aveline fashion, she did very little to hide the frustration in her voice. Or in her body language. Or on her face. “I don’t have _time_ for this. I need to speak with Hawke.”

“And why, pray tell, would you think she’d be _here?_ ”

Aveline leveled her gaze at him, her eyes narrowing warningly beneath furrowed brows. “I followed the blood.”

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s a fair point. _Hawke_ …”

The curtain was flung aside yet again, not enough to fully put Hawke on display, but _more_ than enough to cause Aveline to turn away. Maker, it was still a _lot_ of blood. “Aveline! How good to see you! What a long trip you’ve made to find me! Look at you in all of your resplendent, shiny armor, and look at me in my…nothing. What a pair we ma—”

“ _Hawke_ ,” she said firmly, eyes still averted.

Without missing a beat, Hawke dropped her joking pretense, instead clucking her tongue. “Why does _everyone_ say my name like that? Like you’re admonishing a _pet_.”

“Well let’s see, you…track dead things into other people’s homes, knock things over to see what’ll happen, you—oh, you’re _always_ putting questionable shit into your mouth…” Varric listed them off one by one, ticking each point on a finger.

Hawke held her hands up in defeat, heaving a dramatic sigh. “Point taken. _Points_ taken. Forget I asked.”

“Oh to the flames with this,” Aveline grumbled, resolutely turning to face Hawke. “You and I need to have a—” And just as quickly as she had begun, she stopped again, eyes narrowing further. Not in frustration, not in exasperation, but something debatably worse. _Suspicion._ She looked between Hawke and Varric, face slowly puckering into something resembling dawning distress. “Am I…interrupting something?”

 _There_ it was. “Afraid you’re going to need to specify the sort of ‘something’ you’re referring to,” Varric said with a shrug and a smirk, always a fan of watching the more… _uptight_ members of their motley crew squirm.

Aveline’s expression darkened, her discomfort becoming increasingly evident as she turned away from Hawke once more. “Something I shouldn’t be seeing?”

He considered his answer carefully, raising and lowering his hands in front of himself like scales. “ _Probably?_ ”

She made a choked noise, but before she could respond any further, Hawke had gone back to showering, waving a hand in their general direction, sending a fine spray of water fanning across the floor. “Look, Aveline, just go out back out there, buy yourself a pint, and I’ll be with you when I’m done.”

“ _Hawke_ , the captain of the guard can’t be seen sitting around drinking on Kirkwall’s dime while on the job.”

“Then put it on _my_ tab,” Hawke drawled, speaking as though it had been the most obvious option. “There, problem solved!”

It seemed for a moment as though she was going to argue against it further…but after another disquieted glance between the shower and Varric, Aveline turned on her heel and disappeared, Dog barking a cheerful sendoff.

Only once the clanking of her armor faded into the distant noise of the Hanged Man did Varric ask the question that had been smoldering in plain view all the while. “What did you do this time?”

“What did _I_ do? Why do you assume _I’m_ the one at fault?”

“Do I really need to dignify that with a response?”

She scoffed a quiet laugh, “Point taken. Again. You can stop doing that. But believe me, I doubt entirely she wants to discuss, uh…” Another ripple, and he could imagine her gesturing to herself, “This.”

That didn’t help. That didn’t help at all. “…why would you think _that?_ ”

“Just doesn’t seem like guard business, if you ask me.”

He closed his eyes, squeezing them tightly shut while weighing his words. One of the _other_ little joys of Hawke was living in a near-constant state of whiplash when it came to things like this. There was always something. Maker, there was always _something._ “Hawke, what happened out there?”

“Huh?” she hummed, sounding distracted. “Oh, Coterie. At least I think.”

“You thi—how can you not be _sure?_ ”

“What do you mean, how can I not be _sure?!_ Varric, you’ve _seen_ it! Sometimes people just… _attack_ me! It gets hard to keep track of who or what or why. They’re always just shouting shit like ‘Get her!’ and ‘It’s the Fereldan!’ or ‘This is for what you did to Rolf!’ Those are the ones I always feel the worst for, you know? The ones who say a name. Because, shit, _I_ can’t remember that person, but _clearly_ I did _something_ to them, so in a way I suppose it’s _fair_ that they come after me, but—”

There was a flurry of feathers so sudden, so unexpected, that Varric actually yelled out, reeling back a step or two, nearly tripping over something large and solid in the process. He turned in time to catch himself before falling onto Dog, who had, in fact, gotten up and trotted over to the washroom to follow…

“ _Hawke!_ ” Anders was pale and breathless with what sounded to be worry, head moving quickly as he appeared to notice each splotch of blood on the floor in rapid succession. 

Entirely unperturbed, Hawke let out another tired groan. “See? _Everyone_ says my name like that!”

Straightening himself back up, Varric took a moment to rake his fingers through his hair. “Could _someone_ announce themselves before entering my _home?_ I know, I know, it’s a lot to ask from the man who literally lives in the sewer, but _still_ —”

If he heard the jab, Anders gave no outward signs. He grimaced as his eyes fell on the pile of Hawke’s clothes in the corner. Admittedly, it was…difficult to place what color they had been that morning. “I heard shouting out in the market, and then I followed the blood—are you all right?”

“Fine!” she reassured him, that same detached cheerfulness really driving home the ridiculousness of the situation.

A beat passed, Anders’s grimace beginning to soften. Varric could almost literally see the cogs turning in his head as he connected the dots. “Do you need any healing?” he asked after a moment, his tone suggesting he already knew her answer.

“Uh, hang on…” Hawke said, voice droning with momentary uncertainty behind the waving curtain as she supposedly checked herself over. “No, I’m perfectly okay. A few bumps and bruises, but that’s nothing new. Honestly, I don’t even think any of that’s _mine!_ ” she laughed, bringing both of their attention back to the sheer amount of blood in question.

The corners of Anders’s eyes turned down in a faint frown at that. “Well _that’s_ not a concerning thing to say _at all_.”

“You know,” Varric said, leaning towards him, “The ones outside probably could use some help, Blondie.”

“No they most certainly could _not_ ,” Anders said quickly, the frenzy leaving his voice as he breathed a sigh of relief. “They’re all _exceptionally_ dead.”

“Yeah, probably a little too late for them, huh?”

“ _All?_ ” Varric asked, turning to watch the shower curtain with an expression caught neatly between disbelief and pride. “Hawke!”

“ _They_ attacked _me_ ,” she repeated, speaking in the tone of a parent lecturing a particularly troublesome child. “I cannot and will not be held accountable for _their_ poor decisions.”

Anders had taken to rubbing at his temples in some attempt at banishing the anxiety that had sent him shooting into the room like a comet. “Are you _certain_ you’re all right?” he asked, shoulders rising and falling with a slow, deliberate breath.

Hawke stuck her hand out of the shower and flashed him a brief thumbs-up in lieu of actually answering. It seemed to be good enough for Anders. He shot Varric one last, lingering look, those sad eyes of his somehow managing to express ‘ _It never ends, does it?_ ’ with perfect clarity before he left as Aveline had, Dog’s footsteps following after him. 

“Okay.” Varric watched over his shoulder as Anders disappeared into the tavern. “Okay. I think I’ve got a pretty solid idea of what today’s going to be. Could you just… _please_ hurry up and get out of there already?”

“Well, _maybe_ I wouldn’t be taking so long if I wasn’t getting interrupted every thirty seconds…”

“Hawke. I’m going to share something with you right now. It’s going to be a rare moment of vulnerability, so I’d appreciate it if you took this to heart.” He paused, waiting what he thought was the appropriate amount of time to get across how deathly serious he was. “I am. _Horrified_ of what condition you’re leaving my shower in.” 

She laughed, poking her head out again. And oh, how and _why_ did her hair _still_ look like it was encased in gelatinous gore? “Don’t worry, it’s not like I’m using any of your fancy soaps.”

“I—Hawke, use the soap.”

“No, it’s fine, I’m just giving everything a rinse-down. It’s…ugh, it’s my hair that’s giving me the worst problem, which is strange because I don’t even know _how_ I got so much in my _hair_. Genuinely, it’s the damnedest thing…”

“Use the _soap_ , Marian.”

Hawke scooped her hair back from her face with an unpleasant _shlorp_ sound, eyes wide and impossibly blue as she gasped. “Full name? Oh my,” she muttered, not without a trace of concern. A moment later, her head had disappeared behind the curtain.

There was a minute—a full, beautiful minute—where Varric thought that was that. It was over and done with. And then he heard the soft, swaggering clicks of footfalls, and felt himself finally give up; it was going to be one of those days whether he liked it or not, so really, what use was there in fighting it? “Rivaini,” he said in way of greeting.

Isabela stopped just behind him, her many chains and baubles jingling as she set her hands on her hips. “ _You_ sound less than pleased. Could that have something to do with the slobbering mongrel in your bed?”

From the shower, there was an incensed shout. “ _Hey!_ ”

Smiling her slow, fetching smile, Isabela chuckled. “I was referring to the _dog_ , Hawke.”

There was no fighting the groan that wormed its way up his throat. “Ugh, he’s on the _bed?_ ”

“Sorry to say,” she said with a nod. “I won’t keep you, Aveline’s already warned me of all the…” she paused, favoring Varric with a teasing quirk of her eyebrow, “ _Untoward_ things going on in here. I’m looking for Fenris, as it were. Where could I find him?”

“How should _I_ know? He’s not here.”

She paused, the hooked line of her smirk turning downwards into the first hint of a frown. “Are you sure? I followed all the blood. I—” Realization dawned in her eyes clear as day, and she nodded. “Ah, I see. Wrong blood trail. Figures.”

“Happens to the best of us.”

“Shit, this means I’ve got to actually put _effort_ into tracking him down. Unless…” Her grin found its way back to her lips and she leaned over Varric to direct her voice towards the shower. “Not in there _with_ you, is he?”

“No, Bela,” Hawke dutifully replied with a snicker of her own.

“Better _not_ be.”

“Damn. All right. At least I tried.” She pursed her lips to blow an air-kiss in the general direction of the washroom, turning to leave. Her footsteps stopped abruptly, and there was another jingle as she turned around again. “You know…Aveline _also_ said something about you opening a tab…”

“Go ahead.”

“Oh Hawke, you are a _true_ friend.”

That time, Varric didn’t bother waiting until she was out of earshot. “Should we take bets on who’s next? Do you think Gamlen needs to borrow some money? Or, oh, maybe Daisy just wants to visit.”

“I’m a popular woman, Varric, I don’t know what to tell you.”

That was the problem. They were just going to keep coming. If not to see _him,_ then to find _her_ , and Maker’s breath, it was already getting old. “Hawke. Aveline’s out there nursing a _distinctly_ incorrect idea about what’s going on in here, and I’m _sure_ the other two are only going to encourage it. Especially if she’s _talking_ about it. So can you please _finish_ and at least take care of _that_ part of all of this?” 

“I’m hurrying! I’m hurrying! But you know…” she pushed the curtain aside _just_ so, striking a pose that might’ve been more enticing, had the _entire_ right side of her ribcage been a purple-black bruise. “You could stop lecturing me, close the door, and we could make it so that Aveline’s suspicions are distinctly _correct_ …” 

He watched her for a moment longer, drumming his fingers against his arm, feeling his eyes start to crinkle with the grin he’d been trying to hold back. “How about _this…_ Wash the blood out of your hair and then we’ll discuss it.”

Hawke rolled her eyes and snapped the curtain shut. “You are absolutely _no_ fun. I do hope you know that. None at all.”

“Use the soap, Hawke.”

“Ugh. _Fine_.”


End file.
